After Johnson had taken his supper in the kitchen, he went to his loft
in the carriage house and dressed himself with much care. No belle of
a court circle could bestow more mind on a toilet than did Johnson. On
second thought, he was more like a priest arraying himself for some
parade of the church. As he emerged from his room and sauntered down
the carriage-drive, no one would have suspected him of ever having
washed a buggy.
[Illustration: "No One Would Have Suspected Him of Ever Having Washed
a Buggy"]
It was not altogether a matter of the lavender trousers, nor yet the
straw hat with its bright silk band. The change was somewhere, far in
the interior of Henry. But there was no cake-walk hyperbole in it. He
was simply a quiet, well-bred gentleman of position, wealth, and other
necessary achievements out for an evening stroll, and he had never
washed a wagon in his life.
In the morning, when in his working-clothes, he had met a
friend--"Hello, Pete!" "Hello, Henry!" Now, in his effulgence, he
encountered this same friend. His bow was not at all haughty. If it
expressed anything, it expressed consummate generosity--"Good-evenin',
Misteh Washington." Pete, who was very dirty, being at work
in a potato-patch, responded in a mixture of abasement and
appreciation--"Good-evenin', Misteh Johnsing."
The shimmering blue of the electric arc lamps was strong in the main
street of the town. At numerous points it was conquered by the orange
glare of the outnumbering gaslights in the windows of shops. Through
this radiant lane moved a crowd, which culminated in a throng before
the post-office, awaiting the distribution of the evening mails.
Occasionally there came into it a shrill electric street-car, the
motor singing like a cageful of grasshoppers, and possessing a great
gong that clanged forth both warnings and simple noise. At the little
theatre, which was a varnish and red plush miniature of one of the
famous New York theatres, a company of strollers was to play "East
Lynne." The young men of the town were mainly gathered at the corners,
in distinctive groups, which expressed various shades and lines of
chumship, and had little to do with any social gradations. There they
discussed everything with critical insight, passing the whole town in
review as it swarmed in the street. When the gongs of the electric
cars ceased for a moment to harry the ears, there could be heard the
sound of the feet of the leisurely crowd on the bluestone pavement,
and it was like the peaceful evening lashing at the shore of a lake.
At the foot of the hill, where two lines of maples sentinelled the
way, an electric lamp glowed high among the embowering branches, and
made most wonderful shadow-etchings on the road below it.
When Johnson appeared amid the throng a member of one of the profane
groups at a corner instantly telegraphed news of this extraordinary
arrival to his companions. They hailed him. "Hello, Henry! Going to
walk for a cake to-night?"
"Ain't he smooth?"
"Why, you've got that cake right in your pocket, Henry!"
"Throw out your chest a little more."
Henry was not ruffled in any way by these quiet admonitions and
compliments. In reply he laughed a supremely good-natured, chuckling
laugh, which nevertheless expressed an underground complacency of
superior metal.
Young Griscom, the lawyer, was just emerging from Reifsnyder's barber
shop, rubbing his chin contentedly. On the steps he dropped his hand
and looked with wide eyes into the crowd. Suddenly he bolted back into
the shop. "Wow!" he cried to the parliament; "you ought to see the
coon that's coming!"
Reifsnyder and his assistant instantly poised their razors high and
turned towards the window. Two belathered heads reared from the
chairs. The electric shine in the street caused an effect like water
to them who looked through the glass from the yellow glamour of
Reifsnyder's shop. In fact, the people without resembled the
inhabitants of a great aquarium that here had a square pane in it.
Presently into this frame swam the graceful form of Henry Johnson.
"Chee!" said Reifsnyder. He and his assistant with one accord threw
their obligations to the winds, and leaving their lathered victims
helpless, advanced to the window. "Ain't he a taisy?" said Reifsnyder,
marvelling.
But the man in the first chair, with a grievance in his mind, had
found a weapon. "Why, that's only Henry Johnson, you blamed idiots!
Come on now, Reif, and shave me. What do you think I am--a mummy?"
Reifsnyder turned, in a great excitement. "I bait you any money that
vas not Henry Johnson! Henry Johnson! Rats!" The scorn put into this
last word made it an explosion. "That man was a Pullman-car porter or
someding. How could that be Henry Johnson?" he demanded, turbulently.
"You vas crazy."
The man in the first chair faced the barber in a storm of indignation.
"Didn't I give him those lavender trousers?" he roared.
And young Griscom, who had remained attentively at the window, said:
"Yes, I guess that was Henry. It looked like him."
"Oh, vell," said Reifsnyder, returning to his business, "if you think
so! Oh, vell!" He implied that he was submitting for the sake of
amiability.
Finally the man in the second chair, mumbling from a mouth made timid
by adjacent lather, said: "That was Henry Johnson all right. Why, he
always dresses like that when he wants to make a front! He's the
biggest dude in town--anybody knows that."
"Chinger!" said Reifsnyder.
[Illustration: "'Henry Johnson! Rats!'"]
Henry was not at all oblivious of the wake of wondering ejaculation
that streamed out behind him. On other occasions he had reaped this
same joy, and he always had an eye for the demonstration. With a face
beaming with happiness he turned away from the scene of his victories
into a narrow side street, where the electric light still hung high,
but only to exhibit a row of tumble-down houses leaning together like
paralytics.
The saffron Miss Bella Farragut, in a calico frock, had been crouched
on the front stoop, gossiping at long range, but she espied her
approaching caller at a distance. She dashed around the corner of the
house, galloping like a horse. Henry saw it all, but he preserved the
polite demeanor of a guest when a waiter spills claret down his cuff.
In this awkward situation he was simply perfect.
The duty of receiving Mr. Johnson fell upon Mrs. Farragut, because
Bella, in another room, was scrambling wildly into her best gown. The
fat old woman met him with a great ivory smile, sweeping back with the
door, and bowing low. "Walk in, Misteh Johnson, walk in. How is you
dis ebenin', Misteh Johnson--how is you?"
Henry's face showed like a reflector as he bowed and bowed, bending
almost from his head to his ankles, "Good-evenin', Mis' Fa'gut;
good-evenin'. How is you dis evenin'? Is all you' folks well, Mis'
Fa'gut?"
After a great deal of kowtow, they were planted in two chairs opposite
each other in the living-room. Here they exchanged the most tremendous
civilities, until Miss Bella swept into the room, when there was more
kowtow on all sides, and a smiling show of teeth that was like an
illumination.
The cooking-stove was of course in this drawing-room, and on the fire
was some kind of a long-winded stew. Mrs. Farragut was obliged to
arise and attend to it from time to time. Also young Sim came in and
went to bed on his pallet in the corner. But to all these
domesticities the three maintained an absolute dumbness. They bowed
and smiled and ignored and imitated until a late hour, and if they had
been the occupants of the most gorgeous salon in the world they could
not have been more like three monkeys.
After Henry had gone, Bella, who encouraged herself in the
appropriation of phrases, said, "Oh, ma, isn't he divine?"
[Illustration: "They Bowed and Smiled Until a Late Hour"]